Critically evaluate the contribution of feminist thinking to the study area of political philosophy, placing particular focus on the works of Iris Young, Carol Pateman, and Hobbes

Social contract theorists such as Hobbes have been very
influential on political philosophy. He wrote in a time when
society was dominated by men, the societal hierarchy revolved
around the masculine, and women largely accepted their relegation
to the role of caregiver and wife. Western political philosophy has
been dominated by conceptions of unity and homogeneity. Difference
has traditionally been suppressed in favour of oneness and the
universal in terms of citizenship. Heterogeneity and personal
desires and passions are thought to have no place in politics and
the structure of human civilizations. Feminist thinking has
challenged these pre-conceptions, as they have tended to make the
exclusion of the female a necessary part of Western political
ideologies. Feminist writers such as Iris Young and Carole
Pateman have been able to re-evaluate long-standing political
concepts and their relationship to the position of women in
society, suggesting reasons for why it is that they have spent
history languishing outside the political sphere.

By examining the foundations upon which political philosophy and
social theory are based, feminist thinking has something practical
to contribute. As Iris Young puts it, using the feminist thinking
of writers such as Irigaray and Kristeva, we can produce "important
results for political philosophy and practical emancipatory
politics." In her view, the aim of such thinking is to "…build a
vision of positively heterogeneous and sensuous public life."
By stating such aims, feminist writers like Young and Carole
Pateman contribute different perspectives and different goals for
political philosophy. In doing so, they awaken new questions for
the study of politics and social contract theory to do with the
nature of unity and diversity, gender and equality, and reason
itself.

She suggests that Habermas' idea of communicative ethics,
whereby reason and truth are not grasped through intuition, but
worked out through discussion, is closer to a view for an inclusive
political framework, although she finds that his version of it does
not hold up under scrutiny, and actually implicitly reproduces the
opposition between reason and desire. With a competent
communicative ethics, however, women (and minorities) would be able
to participate in political life, through the acceptance and
understanding of individual perspectives. 'Reason' as it is needed
in the political sphere, would be derived from the sum of
particulars, rather than attempting to hold on to the 'illusory'
impartial ideal.

The implications ideas and arguments such as these have for
political philosophy is that they shift the way in which the civic
public can be viewed, and broaden the theoretical possibilities for
the political domain. Feminist thinking exposes the dubious logic
behind the foundations and philosophies of the patriarchal
political state, hitherto taken for granted as generally 'correct'
or having been derived from nature and pure rationality. They
refresh the question 'what is reason?' and demand that the theories
underlying the structure of society be re-examined. Can our
political culture remain as it is once we have looked into its
ideological foundations, those of impartiality, justice and reason,
and still find it sound, once we have considered the fact it has at
its genesis an unjust conquest over one gender by the other? These
are questions that feminist thinking has allowed political
philosophy to raise. And politics itself has indeed changed under
the influence of feminism and movements towards equality and
against discrimination. In the twentieth century in particular,
steps taken towards the emancipation of women have helped to ensure
a global consciousness of the female political right, although
there is still some way to go to ensure that the generally white
and masculine domination of politics and indeed of philosophy and
reason itself, becomes more inclusive. But as well as the marriage
contract, we now have 'civil partnerships,' which have no
connotations of conjugal or patriarchal right. In the last few
decades, it has been accepted that a husband can be guilty of
raping his wife: the conjugal right no longer exists in the laws of
our state. Writers such as Young and Pateman have taken the
patriarchal contract theories of old scholars such as Hobbes, and
used their logic and 'reason' to demonstrate the irrational
subjugation of women throughout history, and made the way for women
to take on a larger role in global politics. They have brought in
the serious arena of political philosophy Mary Astell's question:
"If All Men are born Free, how is it that Women are born
Slaves?"